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Make your mission statement go from impossible to possible

As we continue the journey of discussing key components of a strategic marketing plan, let's focus on the mission statement. In recent blog posts, we reviewed a 30,000-level recap of the plan and last month we focused on creating an effective vision for your company.

Many businesses think about the vision, but not the mission of the company. It's sometimes lost in the shuffle because there's a tendency of confusing it with the vision statement. To clarify, the vision statement is:

more long-term in scope,

aspirational and directional, and

drives the direction of the company.

Conversely, a mission statement is the company's operational mantra and its reason for being on a daily basis. In others words, it provides clarity on why all associates in your company go to work — each day.

While it's short-term vs. the vision statement, it does reinforce the overall vision and should not sway too far off the path. If communicated effectively, employees should know the company's purpose and what is its daily mission.

For example, let's take FedEx. It's primary business is ensuring packages are delivered overnight and arrive at their destinations by 10 a.m. the next day. Therefore, the mission is to deliver packages to its location in a timely manner.

To this end, FedEx adopted the famous tagline, "When it absolutely, positively has to be there overnight."

Why is this the company's mission? Because it captures what the company does each day and is the essence of its operations. So, employees know that each day, "their" mission is to somehow ensure packages are packed, shipped and delivered in a timely manner. In other words, they know what they have to do daily in order to accomplish FedEx's mission.

Once developed, the mission statement should be short, concise, relevant and a reflection of what you do each day and should be communicated effectively across the organization — horizontally and laterally.

Once you understand your company's purpose and mission, then you have an opportunity of going from Mission: Impossible to Mission: Possible.